{"id":262767,"date":"2017-10-23T06:00:37","date_gmt":"2017-10-22T20:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=262767"},"modified":"2017-10-23T06:00:37","modified_gmt":"2017-10-22T20:00:37","slug":"dirges-for-the-shipwrecked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/dirges-for-the-shipwrecked\/","title":{"rendered":"Dirges for the shipwrecked"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em> \u201cAnd these mine eyes shall see all times, how they are lost in the sea of vast eternity.\u201d<\/em><br \/>\n\u2014Robert Herrick (1591-1674)<\/p>\n<p>Maritime Messages the Mainland Missed<br \/>\nOf that calm before and during the storm<br \/>\ntempestuous times with life jackets and life boats<br \/>\nthrowing out lifelines in many different forms<br \/>\nflotsam and jetsam is filled with glass floats<br \/>\nin the sea foam high tide and hurricanes crest<br \/>\ntropical typhoons ignore the strongest jetty<br \/>\nmany lives are lost, tears on the dead man\u2019s chest<br \/>\nundercurrents sweep away all those not ready<br \/>\nin the Mariana Trench deepest part of the ocean<br \/>\ndown in the depths volcanoes flow without sound<br \/>\nunderwater sea life exists without commotion<br \/>\ndirges for the shipwrecked, drowned, never found<br \/>\nmessages in songs, ballads, bottles lost at sea<br \/>\nisland harbors and havens for Pacific poetry.<br \/>\n\u00a0<br \/>\nMoonlight on Tinian and Manchuria<br \/>\nMoonlight shines on the Pacific Ocean tonight<br \/>\nthe smell of the sea comes up the island cliffs<br \/>\nI drink two cans of warm \u2018Kloud\u2019 Korean beer<br \/>\nthe constellation Lyra the Harp fades from sight<br \/>\nmoonlight dances on water, clouds up in the sky<br \/>\nall alone I start to hum the old song \u2018Stardust\u2019<br \/>\nthen think of Dean Martin singing \u2018Amore\u2019<br \/>\n\u201c\u2026the moon hits your eyes like a big pizza pie\u201d<br \/>\nI toast friendly dragon clouds passing in the night<br \/>\nyou told me you saw them in the sky in China<br \/>\nthey dance and disappear in the warm moonlight<br \/>\nyou are north of North Korea in Manchuria<br \/>\nvisiting your mother in Heilongjiang province<br \/>\nnow the moon shines on the Black Dragon River.<\/p>\n<p>Heilongjiang is a province in NE China in northern Manchuria. Heilongjiang means Black Dragon River in the Chinese language.<\/p>\n<p>From Yesteryear to Buds in Your Ear<br \/>\nGone are the days of nickel candy bars, five cent cigars<br \/>\nforgotten the telephone booth make your call for a dime<br \/>\ngazing up and hitching your wagon to wandering stars<br \/>\nwedding parties singing \u2018get me to the church on time\u2019<br \/>\nyesterday it was astronauts and landing on the moon<br \/>\nvinyls, cassette tapes,VHS morphing into cds and dvds<br \/>\nelephants in the circus and daring on a flying trapeze<br \/>\na camp fire barbecue strumming and humming a tune<br \/>\nnow people can\u2019t take their eyes off their I phone 24 7s<br \/>\nno talk at meals cell phones take photos reach far away<br \/>\ncommunication satellites rotate high up in the heavens<br \/>\ntweeters tweet FB memes and shares, instagram all day<br \/>\none would think all this stimuli fills every little void<br \/>\nyet our nation is in peril, death from synthetic opioids.<\/p>\n<p>Been Up So Long it Looks Like Dawn to Me<br \/>\nI\u2019ve been up for so long it looks like dawn to me<br \/>\nway up in the clouds a little pink in the stratosphere<br \/>\nnight is flying away and dawn is just about to be<br \/>\njet airplanes passing back and forth from there to here<br \/>\nbeen uptown for musical dates and I\u2019d like to stay there<br \/>\nwhy go downtown when this is what I want to hear<br \/>\nbeen up and down and around the block, once in pairs<br \/>\nbeen up the fast elevator and the big escalator too<br \/>\nand trudged up and down many the flight of stairs<br \/>\nbeen up to heaven in another life far above the blue<br \/>\nbeen up so long it feels like relative normal life to me<br \/>\non the island of Tinian\u2019s cliffs high above the sea<br \/>\nmy sunrise spirit is up and I refuse to wear a frown<br \/>\nas the late Tom Petty sang, \u201c\u2026and I won\u2019t back down.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cAnd these mine eyes shall see all times, how they are lost in the sea&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[18759,18760,21,18761],"class_list":["post-262767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion","tag-black-dragon-river","tag-kloud-korean","tag-life","tag-robert-herrick"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=262767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=262767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=262767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=262767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}